


The horrors that I promised you I'd bring

by sparrow30



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: All is not what it seems, Discussion of Canon Events, Gen, Post-Battle of Sodden Hill, Self-Reflection, Serious Injuries, Yennefer has to confront things about herself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-17 16:28:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29103306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sparrow30/pseuds/sparrow30
Summary: The chaos floods through her veins, manifesting as white-hot flames in the palms of her hands. She screams her pain and fury as she forces it out into the world, the smell of charred trees and burnt flesh invading her senses and almost suffocating her. For a moment there is only fire, and the devastation it reigns, and then there’s nothing but darkness.When Yennefer wakes, she’s alone.
Relationships: Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg, Tissaia de Vries & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg, Triss Merigold & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg
Comments: 7
Kudos: 29
Collections: The Witcher Quick Fic #05





	The horrors that I promised you I'd bring

The chaos floods through her veins, manifesting as white-hot flames in the palms of her hands. She screams her pain and fury as she forces it out into the world, the smell of charred trees and burnt flesh invading her senses and almost suffocating her. For a moment there is only fire, and the devastation it reigns, and then there’s nothing but darkness. 

* * *

When Yennefer wakes, she’s alone. 

Every muscle in her body aches, and every breath feels like there’s a blacksmith’s anvil resting on her chest. She opens her eyes slowly, bracing for the sharp stab of daylight, but instead she’s met with the pitch black of night.

She slowly rolls onto her front, whimpering as every tiny movement sends sparks of pain ricocheting through her body. She has to take a second to collect herself before pushing up into a kneeling position, even that small action leaving her gasping for breath. The ground underneath her is surprisingly soft, and her fingers feel out enough tufts of living grass to know that she’s still outside, but not anywhere near Sodden Hill or the flames -  _ her _ flames - that had engulfed it. 

She blinks a few more times, and slowly the world starts to reveal itself to her; the dark outline of a row of trees appearing in the distance, their backdrop an almost equally dark night sky. There’s not a star to be seen, nor even the hint of a cloud, just endless inky blackness as far as her eyes can see.

She has no idea where she is but she can’t stay here, that much is certain. She needs to make her way back to Sodden, to continue to fight or to help with the aftermath. With what feels like a truly inhuman amount of effort she struggles to her feet, her weight slumping heavily to the side as her more serious injuries make themselves known. Her left foot feels broken, it hurts to put even the slightest weight on it, and a sharp stabbing in her side suggests at least one broken rib.

Still, she’s no stranger to pain; her younger years were awash with it. She had always assumed that a base level of discomfort was normal, right up until the moment her transformation revealed to her what the complete absence of pain felt like. In some ways this is comfortingly familiar, the knowledge that there will be pain in every step, pain she’ll just have to grit her teeth and ignore because there’s nothing else to be done.

She knows without even needing to check that her chaos is entirely depleted. There will be no portals for her any time soon, so she’s going to have to tackle this the old-fashioned way and walk. She straightens as best she can and turns, scanning the horizon for any identifying signs. 

For a long while there’s nothing, long enough that Yennefer starts to think she’ll just have to take a wild guess which direction to head in. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, a flicker of light appears on the horizon, there and gone so quickly she thinks she might have imagined it. She frowns and squints, focusing on the point in the distance. A few heartbeats later the light flashes into view again, visible for just a second but enough to convince her that it’s not a mirage. 

It might not be much, but it’s more than she can see in any other direction so it will have to do.

Squaring her shoulders she takes a small step forward, grunting in pain as she’s forced to put weight on her injured foot. For a horrifying moment she fears it won’t hold and she’ll go toppling to the ground, but although her ankle shakes she remains mercifully upright.

From there it’s simply a case of putting one foot in front of the other, again and again and again, ignoring the screams of protest that start at her feet but quickly spread through her entire body. Every so often she scans the horizon to make sure she’s still heading in the right direction, but for the most part her gaze is trained on the ground in front of her. 

Step.

She can do this, she has to do this.

Step.

At least her own whimpers of pain drown out the screams of the dying echoing in her head.

Step.

“Where are you going?”

Yennefer yelps in surprise, head whipping towards the source of the noise. Standing next to her is a young girl wrapped in a dark blue cloak. Her hair is so pale it’s almost white, her eyes the most vivid green, and Yennefer has the strangest feeling that she’s known this girl forever, despite being sure she’s never laid eyes on her before.

“Who are you?” she asks, the slight quaver in her voice betraying her shock. “Where did you come from?”

The girl tilts her head to the side, looking curiously up at Yennefer. “You’re different to how I imagined,” she says instead of answering either of Yennefer’s questions.

“I…” Yennefer starts before trailing off into silence. It’s been a long,  _ long _ time since she’s been caught this off-guard by a stranger. She doesn’t like it. “How do you know who I am?”

The girl smiles, as if Yennefer has said something very funny indeed. “Geralt told me all about you.”

“I see. And you’re with Geralt because...?”

“Destiny, of course”

“Oh, of course.” Yennefer feels an all-too familiar stab of pain in her chest as she thinks back to her and Geralt’s last meeting, to what Borch had revealed about the artifice of their feelings for one another.

There’s something darkly ironic, she can’t help thinking bitterly, that Geralt of all people has seemingly ended up with a daughter of destiny while she’s still childless.

“I’m your destiny too,” the girl says, as if reading Yennefer’s mind. “But you’re not ready for me, not yet.”

Yennefer’s heart jumps in her chest at that declaration, dragging up a foolish thread of hope that keeps stubbornly refusing to die. She firmly squashes it back down where it belongs and raises an arch eyebrow at the girl instead. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“That’s okay, it will soon,” the girl says as she pulls her hood up, shrouding her face in darkness. “I have to go now.”

“No, wait,” Yennefer’s cold demeanor evaporates at the threat of the girl leaving. She reaches out towards her, but she dances out of range and Yennefer’s fingers close around thin air.

“Don’t worry, we’ll meet again soon,” the child promises. “You can’t outrun destiny.” With that she turns away from Yennefer and strides back into the darkness. Her figure is quickly consumed by the night, until not even the outline of her cloak can be seen.

Yennefer can feel her heart beating in her throat. Her mind desperately trying and failing to comprehend what just happened. The girl appeared from nowhere, and disappeared just as quickly. Had she been a ghost? A monster? Or perhaps just a particularly vivid hallucination?

A bright flash catches her attention, and she turns back towards her destination. The light is back again, and now that she’s closer she can make out the definition of dancing fire. It’s impossible to tell how large the fire is - it could be a single campfire or it could be Sodden still in flames - but it’s enough to reinforce Yennefer’s belief that she’s heading in the right direction.

Putting her strange visitor firmly out of her mind she trudges forward again. Her first priority has to be to get somewhere safe, then she can think about everything else.

Time starts to lose all meaning as she walks, moving in a way that doesn’t quite make sense. For long stretches it feels like she’s walking on the spot, the flicking light on the horizon as unchanging as the scenery to her left and right. Then, just when she’s about to give it all up as a lost cause the fire jumps forward, bringing her target miles closer in the space of a moment. Every time it happens she doesn’t know whether to scream in frustration or cry out in relief, so she clamps her lips together and does neither.

“You’re almost there, my child.”

This time she doesn’t jump in surprise, but it’s a close thing. It probably helps that the voice to her left is one she would know anywhere, in any situation. The last voice she heard before she ended up here - wherever here is.

“Tissaia,” she breathes, drawing to a halt and turning towards her mentor. “How are you here?”

Tissaia looks nothing like she did when Yennefer last saw her at Sodden. Gone are her battle-worn robes, the streaks of blood and mud and gore covering her skin. Instead she looks as she always does in Yennefer’s memories; the stern, captivating rectoress of Aretuza who Yennefer never quite knew whether to love or hate.

“I wanted so much for you, but I feared so much for you too.” Tissaia says instead of answering Yennefer’s question. “You burn so fierce, and so bright, I never knew if it was you controlling your chaos or the other way around.” 

“What happened at Sodden? Did we win?” Yennefer reaches out towards Tissaia but just like with the girl she steps gracefully out of reach. “Tell me I helped, that my sacrifice was enough.”

“Will anything ever be enough for you? Will you ever be truly content?” Tissaia looks sad as she steps forward again, bringing both hands up to cup Yennefer’s cheeks. The contact feels strange, almost inhuman, but Yennefer finds she’s not scared. Instead she leans into the touch, seeking the comfort of the situation, however it might come.

“I want to be,” she whispers, more to herself than anything. “But I don’t know how.”

“You will,” Tissaia says. “One day, you will.”

Yennefer closes her eyes as a tear trickles down her cheek. Tissaia gently thumbs away the liquid before pressing a soft kiss in its place. “You need to go home now,” she says gently. “They’re waiting for you.”

The hands on her face disappear, and Yennefer opens her eyes to find herself alone once more. 

Warmth at her back makes her turn away from the spot where Tissaia had been standing, and she finds that the fire has crept up on her again, coming right up to her feet to greet her. She stares up at the large bonfire crackling in front of her, almost twice her height at the very top, and feels a sense of wonderment in her chest she knows she hasn’t felt in a very long time.

The fire dances and flickers in the night air, playful in a way that her flames at Sodden had most certainly not been. Her fire had been created to hurt, to injure and kill and destroy. But this fire…

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

There’s no surprise this time when Yennefer turns towards her third visitor of the night. Triss is a vision next to her, resplendent in a velvet green gown that accentuates the dark curls cascading over her shoulders. She’s smiling, a warm comforting thing that seems so out of place in this unknown landscape.   
  
“Can it be beautiful, when it has such power to devastate?” Yennefer finds herself asking. When she closes her eyes the flames are still there, only these ones are accompanied by the sounds of a world burning to the ground.

“I don’t think one necessarily precludes the other,” Triss says sagely, staring deep into the burning logs as Yennefer stares at her. “Fire can cause great damage, it’s true, but it can also nurture. It keeps us warm when the elements seek to freeze us, it keeps us safe when the night creeps in all around. It feeds us, and brings us together. Are those not all things of beauty?”

“Then it’s me,” Yennefer replies, feeling the answer settle painfully in the pit of her stomach. “I’m the devastating one.” 

“You are powerful, and with that brings decisions on a scale that most people cannot even comprehend,” Triss says, turning back to Yennefer. “Sometimes you’ll make the right ones, sometimes you won’t. You won’t know which one this was until you come back to us.”

“I’m trying!” Yennefer exclaims, throwing her hands in the air in frustration. “I shouldn’t be here! I should be back at Sodden, I  _ need _ to be back there so that I can help!”

“Sodden is gone,” Triss says calmly, completely unperturbed by Yennefer’s outburst. “It is gone, but you are not. Not if you don’t want to be.”

“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” Yennefer feels the tears of frustration building behind her eyes. “I don’t understand where I am, or what’s going on, I just want to  _ leave _ .”

“Do you really?” 

“Of course! How can you even ask me that?”

Triss says nothing, just stares at Yennefer, and Yennefer feels like a first year at Aretuza all over again.

  
  


“It all burned,  _ everything _ . People, animals, plants. Nothing was spared,” she forces herself to admit. “Tissaia told me to save people, but all I did was destroy.” She looks away from Triss, furiously blinking back tears. “What will I be going back to? What will I have to face about myself?”

“You know I can’t answer that,” Triss says quietly, and Yennefer barks out a harsh laugh in response.

“You know, everyone I’ve met here tonight has been absolutely useless,” she says with an exaggerated huff. “Would it really kill any of you to give me a single straightforward answer?”

Triss chuckles softly and holds out both of her hands in offering. “Alright. If you want to leave, then we leave. Is that straightforward enough?” She says it like it’s the easiest thing in the world. Maybe it is, but Yennefer isn’t used to anything in her life being easy.

Then again, it’s not like she can stay here forever. Maybe she doesn’t know what she’s returning to, but she’s never been the type to do anything other than address her problems head on. She glances back out into the darkness, towards where she met Tissaia of her past, and the white-haired girl of her supposed future. She’s still not entirely sure what either of them were trying to teach her, but she has a feeling she’ll find out in time. 

“Okay,” she says with a decisive nod, taking her friend’s hands in her own and gently squeezing her fingers for comfort. “Let’s go then.”

* * *

In a healing tent on the outskirts of what used to be Sodden Hill, Triss releases her chaos with a heavy exhale. She looks down at Yennefer’s unconscious form and smiles as her eyelids start to flicker.   
  
“That’s it,” she says in exhausted relief. “Come back to us Yen. We all need you, now more than ever.”

  
  


  
  
  



End file.
